So That’s How Evolution Works…

My first thought was the same as Greg, that the gunman is a creationist. If the cut-outs were anti-evolution the gunman would be facing the other way?

In light of the billboard shown, I can see how you interpreted it as anti-evolution but that is not how it struck me. I laughed. I saw it as saying that after the long struggle of evolution we are stupid enough to turn on our own history and deny it. I saw it as anti religious. But I suppose if that had been the intent the gun would have been levelled at the pre-human hominids…

Oh, and as for this site being less Friendly… you are right Greg G but I think it’s necessary.
It is more than time to revoke the societal respect afforded to religious views. Denial of reason belongs to the past and will do nothing to advance our species. Its hard to find an evil in the world that doesn’t have god’s finger prints on it somewhere. Its time to stop being all friendly and cordial and acting as if it is OK to believe utter BS. It isn’t, it is mentally ill. If an adult human declares a firm belief in Santa Claus or claims to be Jesus or Napoleon we find them a nice white coat and reach for the lithium. There is no difference save numbers between those things and the belief in gods, goddesses, God, magic, ghosts or any of the other various things people hold to.

My thoughts are much the same as Rob on the evolution cutouts, and I thought it was pretty funny. The Answers in Genesis billboard is SHOCKING though.

I’m with the others in not seeing the cut-outs as offensive. I see it as a cynical analysis of human progress and propensity toward gun violence.

The billboard however is a different story…

I agree with Greg, that was my first interpretation. Now that billboard is plain scary. What I don’t see clearly is if they condone violence against atheists or if they believe we will shoot them up for believing in god. Sick, sick, sick.

I join the rest in the cutouts. I took it as a statement of man’s violence. Sort of like Pearl Jam’s “Evolution” video (you tube it or go to their web site if you haven’t seen it; it’s a good one) about how weapons have evolved to cause greater and greater destruction and increase man’s inhumanity to man. Rather a good statement.

The billboard is just twisted and, as you said, stereotyping. You’re comparing apples and oranges in comparing these two.

The evolving man into something funny or unpleasant has been done over and over. The wonderful specimen of stone age pulchritude evolving into a couch potato or overweight Web addict is standard fare.

The second one is stupid, and that anyone would think it was worthy of advertising dollars, scary.

I didn’t see an anti evolution message in the viroids until Hemant mentioned it. It’s art, in a way – you see different things depending on who you are. We’d have to talk to the guy who put it up to find out. Knee jerk assumptions without evidence makes us poor skeptics.

Also, my iPod apparently auto-corrects “cutouts” to “viroids”…WTF?

I too saw the cut outs as representing the battle between creationists and “Darwinists.” It didn’t really take a side on the issue, just acknowledged the issue.

Though I think the interpretation of “Look how far we’ve come in our evolution and we are still killing one another like wild animals” is more likely what the artist intended.

I took the cutouts as a clever statement on the prevalence of violence in our society.

Another vote for prevalence of violence/social commentary.

So that’s what evolution leads to…

It’s offensive, silly, and just plain untrue.

I think it’s pretty safe to say that you wildly misinterpreted the piece (which is something along the lines of anti-gun violence), but judging by the other comments, that message might have been a bit vague.

As for the Answers in Genesis billboard: that thing still pisses me off. As if.

Ho boy. I was wondering when the windmill charging was going to begin.

The first thing I thought of when I saw the silhouettes was that it was a commentary on violence. Then I thought it could be an anti-gun statement. My most cynical thought was that it was a racist commentary.

Anti-evolution never even occurred to me.

@jemand

No you’re not alone in that interpretation especially since the figures are black.

I guess that’s why it’s called art.

@jemand

No, but as I mentioned in my post above yours, it was the last, most cynical thought about them.

I neglected to mention it earlier, but yeah, that stupid creationist billboard really chaps my ass.

Some days it’s hard to defend the rights of these assholes to post this crap, but I still will.

ETA: @Viggo

I agree.

Maybe this is more like it.

Huh, my first reaction to the evolution cutouts was that it was an environmentalist message. We evolved from animals, and the first thing we do is turn around and shoot them. A reaction to something like this ” http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Great_Apes_Face_Imminent_Extinction_From_Habitat_Destruction_UN.html ” (it’s a 2005 article and I have no comment as to whether it’s a good one or not, but that’s what came up on google when I searched for ‘great ape habitat destruction’, which was my first thought when I saw the cutouts.)

Clearly, the cut-out thing is vague (how’s that for irony?). If we knew who put it there, it’d be easier to interpret, maybe. My reaction was that it was a simple (but clever) joke, not necessarily any kind of comment. The first three (left-to-right) figures are part of a standard, static presentation, and the last one is like a “live action” figure, undercutting the whole set-up.

I wonder if the billboard’s image is public domain. I’d love to see somebody put up a duplicate and simply replace “doesn’t” with “does”.

To all those claiming the cutout is showing man’s propensity for violence, wouldn’t that point have been better made if the final cutout was facing in the same direction as the others?

@Hemant: Not really, no. It would be less dramatic that way.

I agree. Even if that wasn’t the case, how would that argument be any sort of support for a religious interpretation of the cutouts? At this point you’re just arguing artistic choices.

Maybe the artist did intend these cutouts to be an anti-evolution or religious statement but if that’s the case I’d say they failed to get even their basic message across in their work. What immediately springs to mind when looking at the cutouts is a commentary on the inherent tendency towards violence in humans.

This kind of reminds me of the guy at the Carl Sagan Institute (I believe, need to go back and check) who accused Gary Larson of being a creationist because of a cartoon Larson did showing dinosaurs and humans co-existing.

The cutouts are good art precisely because there are several different interesting interpretations in the absence of context (we don’t know the artist and it doesn’t have a caption)

I don’t think this is commentary on evolution. It is simply saying that no matter how much we have evolved, we are a still a violent species. Hence the message is that intelligence doesn’t make us more evolved or smarter than our ancestors. It’s art anyway and if it’s offensive that’s a good thing. Art should be offensive or evoke powerful emotion. Even and especially if you don’t agree with the message.

My take on this, (the silhouettes) is that it is art. I would even go so far as to say this is art of a high quality as it engages people and spurs discussion as evidenced in this and other postings. I think this is what art should do, it should not be passive. Oh yeah and the fact that this is very close to an art school is a pretty dead giveaway.
As to the billboard, I feel like that is just an attack of all non Xtians, it’s just vile.

Rob Says:
July 30th, 2010 at 6:46 am

I agree with the posters above that it doesn’t seem like an anti-evolution display. I thought that it was commenting on the nature of mankind, and how we’re not that far removed from animals in that we can have violent impulses and act selfishly.

THIS.

@Greg:

Oh… I thought the cut-out with the gun was meant to represent creationists trying to stop the fact of evolution being taught!

I thought the same thing! Wow, whoever put up these cutouts is really bad at getting their message across. They don’t think evolution is true, and yet they are saying that evolution leads to people shooting people. If they think that evolution is not true, then how can they go around saying that evolution leads to certain things?

They probably meant that believing in evolution leads to violence, but that makes not sense anyway, since violence existed long before the theory of evolution was accepted.

This is like how Jerry Falwell thought Tinky-Winky was gay, right? Whatever you’re preoccupied with, that’s what you see everywhere, whether it’s real or not.

That’s no way to spend your life.

@Moxiequz:

You’re right. It was very confusing. I think I put the first picture (which is definitely by an organization that does not support evolution) together with the second to reach that conclusion.

For all I know, the first one may be a supporter of evolution trying to be funny. Thinking about it now, I shouldn’t have jumped the gun (no pun intended).

I found this public art to be much more creative, clever and as has been made obvious by the amount of speculation amongst the commenters, too open to interpretation to be the work of a creationist. The typical pap spewed out by these folks is predictable and pedestrian. It’s message also can typically be easily dismissed as specious non-sense with a few simple statements (as with the laughable AiG billboard mentioned in this post.)

No, I have to disagree with you on this one, Hemant. I think you misinterpreted this one. Either way, it’s art and I like it.

To all those claiming the cutout is showing man’s propensity for violence, wouldn’t that point have been better made if the final cutout was facing in the same direction as the others?

No, Hemant, what would they be shooting at then? Nothing for all we know. The artist obviously wanted to depict them shooting at a fellow human.